Umoja Biopharma Raises $210M in Series B Funding

Umoja Biopharma

Umoja Biopharma, a Seattle, WA-based oncology company, closed a $210m Series B financing.

The round was co-led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2 and Cormorant Asset Management with participation from new investors, including RTW Investments, LP; Temasek; Presight Capital (the international venture arm of Christian Angermayer’s Apeiron Investment Group); Caas Capital; and an investment fund associated with SVB Leerink. They were joined by all the company’s existing investors: MPM Capital, DCVC Bio, Qiming Venture Partners USA, Casdin Capital, The Emerson Collective, and Alexandria Venture Investments.

Led by Andrew Scharenberg, M.D., co-founder and Chief Executive Officer, and Ryan Crisman, Ph.D., co-founder and Chief Technical Officer, Umoja Biopharma leverages proprietary integrated technologies to reprogram immune cells in vivo to create next-generation immunotherapies for the treatment of solid tumors and hematologic malignancies.

The proceeds will enable the company to continue development of its integrated technologies, advance its product candidates based on CAR T-cell adapter-mediated tumor-targeting (TumorTag) and the in vivo modification of immune cells (VivoVec and RACR/CAR) into clinical development, and build internal manufacturing capabilities to support preclinical and clinical development of its pipeline programs.

The Series B funding will be used in part to advance Umoja’s two lead programs into the clinic: TumorTag UB-TT170 for folate receptor-expressing solid tumors, and VivoVec UB-VV100 for CD19+ hematological cancers.

The company will continue adding to its team to support growth, building upon the recently announced leadership appointments of Nushmia Khokhar, M.D., as Chief Medical Officer, Irena Melnikova, Ph.D., as Chief Financial Officer, and David Fontana, Ph.D., as Chief Business and Strategy Officer, while also expanding its footprint to include a manufacturing operations site in Boulder, Colo.

FinSMEs

21/06/2021